Celebrate with the song “Happy New Year!”

Happy New Year 2025! New Year’s Eve traditions in the US are different from those we celebrated when we lived in Japan. On New Year’s Eve, one of our dear Japanese friends used to bring us homemade soba from a famous restaurant. So delicious! Last year Chuck and I created our own version of toshikoshi soba for New Year’s Eve. Not quite the same, but still a taste of “home.” This year we enjoyed Chinese lo mein.

In this blog, I’d like to share my “Happy New Year” song. It’s quite special to me. When our son Christian was in elementary school, he started playing this simple melody on our piano. This song will stick in your head! Now he’s grown up and is performing in Hollywood! I love this recording of Christian and my husband Chuck singing it at home.

Get your students moving with this super simple song to celebrate the New Year.

(picture taken at a Red Carpet event for his Indie film “Gift of Fear”)

Now you can also go to Spotify to get the professional recording.

No matter how you get my music, it’s great to play it often for children. My friend Kumi plays my CDs in her car. When she brings her three children to different activities, they sing along to songs in English. During my recent trip to Japan, the kids were singing along to my songs when she picked me up in her car. What a precious moment!!

Here are the lyrics to the song. For the Google Slides, click here.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year! Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! Hip hip hooray!

When I first teach the words to this song, students keep a “steady beat” by patting their legs or clapping their hands. I don’t worry about teaching the words first. I lead them through some movements while students listen to the words. Then, I add more challenging movements. Students can pat their legs once, then clap their hands. Think “pat-clap-pat-clap” or “down-up-down-up.” Do this for the first three lines. Before you know it, the students are singing along.

You can ask your students for other steady beat ideas to do during the repeated section.

Try this:

Think, think, think! Think, think, think! What should we do?

If students need help with ideas, offer two choices: Should we do jumping jack jumps or scissor jumps? Should we snap our fingers or pound our fists?

We like to do something special on the last line:

— On Happy New Year! my students like to shake their hands above their heads. Some students like to turn around quickly!

— On Hip hip hooray! students roll their hands, then jump once in place.

For an even bigger challenge, students can do the pat-clap pattern with a partner by patting their own legs, and then “air clapping” both hands with a partner.

Check out this video to see what my students did! Students stand in a circle facing their partner. First they pat their own legs, then clap with their partner. Then they turn to the person on the other side (called a “corner” in folk dance), repeating the pat-clap. They repeat the pattern with their partner, then corner until the Hip hip hooray.

During COVID, every student used a set of sticks, something like the Indian Dandiya dance. This gave students a chance to interact with a partner, but at a distance. Tap my sticks, your sticks, my sticks, your sticks.

Happy New Year 2025! We hope that you keep a song in your heart and a smile on your face. May this year be filled with lots of joy!

Kathy

Happy New Year is one of 15 great songs for kids on Kathy Kampa’s Special Days and Holidays. The CD includes a handy attached booklet with lyrics, and is available for teachers in Japan at ETJ Book Service.

The songs are available for download through iTunes. To hear the studio version of this song, go to iTunes, and click on Track #3.

Kathy’s second CD Jump Jump Everyone is filled with songs to get students moving! Songs and chants build English language skills through simple movement activities. They nurture a child’s imagination and creativity. There are beautiful seasonal songs, lively gross motor movement songs, plus effective transitional songs. Grab a scarf and play along. Grown in the young learner classroom, you’ll find that your children will ask for these songs over and over again.

All of Kathy’s music is now available on many streaming platforms, such as Spotify.

For some of Kathy’s favorite music, check out these Spotify playlists.

Audio & Video

It’s Time to Tidy Up!

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Have you ever struggled to get your children or students to tidy up and clean up the things they’ve taken out? Here’s your secret tool — songs!

Even Mary Poppins knew that! Songs create seamless transitions and make cleaning up a fun, enjoyable task.

Here are some songs that you can play to make your space sparkling clean! You can find this music on iTunes, Spotify, Apple Music, and other streaming sites. Keep them handy for the next time you have a mess to clean up.

Tidy Up is definitely one of my most popular songs. The lyrics are super simple. I wrote it for my Kindergarten students in Japan. The song gets faster and faster. By the time it’s finished, students should have everything cleaned up. Teachers and parents around the world have told me how much they love this song and use it regularly. Ask Alexa to play it for you! You’ll have it ready whenever you need to start tidying up. Or click the arrow below to play it the next time you’re surrounded by a mess!

2. Perhaps you know this cute song from the Barney show. Our children love to sing along!

Clean Up song

Clean up! Clean up! Everybody, everywhere.

Clean up! Clean up! Everybody do your share.

Click the arrow below to play it.

3. Sometimes you have something specific to put away — picture cards, scarves, instruments, etc. Here are some simple songs to play to collect the items.

Cards, Please lyrics by K. Kampa

T: Cards, please. Ss: Here you are!

T: Cards, please. Ss: Here you are!

T: Cards, please. Ss: Here you are!

T/S: Thank you very much!

*What other materials are you using? Instead of singing the word cards, sing a new word such as scarves.

Click the arrow below to play it. Use it in your next English class.

It’s Time to Put the Instruments Away lyrics by K. Kampa

It’s time to put the instruments away!

Oh, it’s time to put the instruments away!

Oh, we’ve had a lot of fun, and we’ve sung a lot of songs,

But, it’s time to put the instruments away.

Click the arrow below to play it. Use it when you use instruments with your class!

4. I love to celebrate our successes with the “We Did It” chant. My students launch into this chant often in my lessons. We always finish our lessons with this. Send your students off with a positive feeling!

We Did It! by Kathy Kampa

We did it! We did it! We did it today!

We did it! We did it! Hip hip hooray!

Click the arrow below to play it. Play this the next time your students do something great.

For more classroom management songs, check out Kathy’s Spotify playlist.

Songwriter Kathy Kampa is a passionate educator of young learners. She seeks to nurture children’s imaginations and spark creativity through fun and engaging activities. Kathy believes that music and movement should be a part of every young child’s education. Kathy’s songs for kids (Kathy Kampa’s Special Days and Holidays and Jump Jump Everyone) are available on iTunes.

Kathy uses a globally-minded and inquiry-based approach to teaching through which students develop 21st-century skills. She also supports the development of English language skills by creating songs, chants, and TPR/movement activities targeted to young learners’ needs.

For more kid-tested music and movement activities, check out more music on iTunes. Kathy has produced two music CDs for very young learners, Kathy Kampa’s Special Days and Holidays and Jump Jump Everyone, which build English language skills through music and movement while nurturing creativity and imagination! Grown and loved by real kids!

It’s the Year of the Dragon!

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January 1st marks the beginning of the year. Each year one of the twelve animals in the Chinese Zodiac calendar is celebrated, and this year’s animal is the Dragon! We have a special place in our home where we display a small ornament for the new year. People celebrating the Lunar or Chinese New Year will welcome the new year of the Dragon on February 10th.

This is a simple song to celebrate the new year. It borrows two familiar melodies to create one new song. The Google slides for this song are here.

It’s the Year of the Dragon By Kathy Kampa

Part A: For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow

It’s the year of the Dragon!

It’s the year of the Dragon,

It’s 2024. (twenty, twenty-four)

Part B: BINGO

I like to have students move with music whenever possible. What kind of movement can you do? Here are some suggestions.

In Part A, on the words “It’s the year” students can stand tall with their hands at their sides.

On the word “DRAGON,” make a dragon pose or movement. My students made a wavy movement with their arms.

For the year 2024 (twenty/ twenty-four), students can write the numbers in the air or hold up their fingers to show the numbers. We made the shapes two-zero-two-four.

In Part B, students can add body percussion sounds. What’s body percussion? Sounds students can make using body parts, such as clapping their hands, patting their legs, stamping their feet, or snapping their fingers. They can play the rhythm of the letters when spelling the word “dragon.” Practice spelling the word with many different sounds. Since this repeats three times, you can repeat it with a different body percussion sound each time. Some of my students even tried body spelling by making each of these letters with their fingers or whole body. Challenging!

If you have unpitched instruments, like rhythm sticks, drums, tambourines, or shakers, play the rhythm with the instruments. You might even add a big cymbal sound on the word, DRAGON.

Since this song comes around once every twelve years, it hasn’t been professionally recorded. Enjoy it with your students to celebrate the new year!

Here’s a video from my online class with my Japanese students. We tried to capture both my students’ movements and my movements.

It’s a cold winter day here! I made a video of the song from the front so that you can see the movements more easily.

Beautiful videos capture authentic dragon dances. Here’s one that you might share with your students.

Go to Kathy’s Spotify playlists to find more music for young learners.

If you’re looking for a craft project, check out this one which uses paper towel rolls. You can use construction paper in lieu of the pom poms.

Kathy currently teaches young learners in her hometown of St. Cloud, Minnesota, USA as well as classes online. She is passionate about creating memorable songs for children that build language as well as music and movement skills. Kathy creates songs that stick in children’s heads long after class. We hope that you enjoy her music, too.

Contact us at magictimekids@gmail.com if you’re looking for a song about a specific idea or topic. We’ll try to write one with that idea in mind.